Wednesday, March 05, 2014

At a press conference for Kremlin-controlled media on Tuesday, Putin reiterated his position that Moscow has the right to use “all means” necessary to protect ethnic Russians and vital military assets in Ukraine, first among them the Black Sea fleet in the Crimean port of Sevastopol.

Reader Comments and Retorts

Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.

Hillary Rodham Clinton would enter the 2016 presidential race better liked and more respected than she was when she ran for the Democratic nomination in 2008, a USA TODAY/Pew Research Center Poll finds.

And yes I posted this just to have at least one comment in the new OTP thread, since it is stupid early to be posting 2016 polls.

Asked whether the international community as a whole has a responsibility to get involved in resolving the situation in Ukraine, less than a third of Americans (30%) think that what is going on in Ukraine is the world’s business. 28% say that the world doesn’t have a responsibility to get involved, while 42% just aren’t sure.

Support for any US intervention to defend Ukraine against a Russian invasion is even lower. Only 18% say that the US has any responsibility to protect Ukraine, while 46% say that the US does not.

Asked whether the international community as a whole has a responsibility to get involved in resolving the situation in Ukraine, less than a third of Americans (30%) think that what is going on in Ukraine is the world’s business. 28% say that the world doesn’t have a responsibility to get involved, while 42% just aren’t sure.

Support for any US intervention to defend Ukraine against a Russian invasion is even lower. Only 18% say that the US has any responsibility to protect Ukraine, while 46% say that the US does not.

Same old, same old. Five minutes before the Pearl Harbor attack, a majority of Americans didn't think either the Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere or Nazi-occupied Europe from the English Channel to the gates of Moscow were worthy of our attention.

Polls! Hadn't seen this one before, the Democrat's favorable rating is down to 39.8%

The GOP is actually rising the last 2 months they've gained about nearly 1.5 points and are now all the way up to 29.1%

What's really scary about Obama's 40-45% favorable/approval ratings is that it pretty much makes him the least disliked politician nationally- the only one who tops him doesn't have a job right now (Hint, her initials are HRC)

Same old, same old. Five minutes before the Pearl Harbor attack, a majority of Americans didn't think either the Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere or Nazi-occupied Europe from the English Channel to the gates of Moscow were worthy of our attention.

Same old, same old. Five minutes before the Pearl Harbor attack, a majority of Americans didn't think either the Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere or Nazi-occupied Europe from the English Channel to the gates of Moscow were worthy of our attention.

And five minutes later, an American naval base on American territory had been bombed in a sneak pre-dawn attack. That might not be the most precise analogy.

I don't think that statement betrays Jason seeing Hitler everywhere; but even if he did, I wouldn't necessarily begrudge him. It was kind of a big deal.

I'm not downplaying Hitler - I'm saying there's a pretty big gulf of difference between a Hitler and autocrat - even an autocrat prone to brutality, totalitarianism, etc... and I think the gulf gets comically large when we also add this layer of "our guy" vs "NOT our guy" autocrats to the analysis.

"At a press conference for Kremlin-controlled media on Tuesday, Putin reiterated his position that he didn't take over Russia in a military-intelligence coup and run it as a kleptocracy for the past decade plus, jailing business rivals and establishing a chokehold on the energy supplies of all of continental Europe."

Forbes just came out with its list of billionaires. Putin was notoriously absent despite being worth at least twice as much as the putative #1 (and that's before you start counting his ability to individually target #2-100 with nuclear missiles).

I'd like to reiterate that I really regret the harm that the Iraq war has done to the discourse surrounding military action. Everything is constantly seen through that prism.

Same old, same old. Five minutes before the Pearl Harbor attack, a majority of Americans didn't think either the Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere or Nazi-occupied Europe from the English Channel to the gates of Moscow were worthy of our attention.

Jason is completely right here. American citizens are being shortsighted if they don't think that what's going on in Ukraine is the world's business. This is completely different from World War 2. It's completely different from Iraq, Vietnam, etc. etc. etc. It's most similar to 19th century great power machinations than anything else, but there's the big angle of nuclear disarmament hanging over the conversation.

The liberal project of the last 50 years has been deeply invested in the disarmament of nuclear weapons. Non-proliferation is the only way to credibly reduce the risk of both nuclear war and catastrophic terrorism. Russia being allowed to invade Ukraine strikes at the very heart of that project.

Luckily, it appears that Russia does not have a deep seated commitment to taking Ukraine, or even Crimea, so it seems very likely that Ukraine's sovereignty will be restored through diplomatic means.

“I advised the staff that calling Ms. Lerner knowing that she will assert her rights was not only improper but dangerous. Ms. Lerner has been the subject of numerous threats on her life and safety, and on the life and safety of her family. I left with the staff recent evidence of those threats,” said Taylor in a letter to Issa.

My personal recommendation to the F.B.I. would be to make a very close examination of the paper and home printers being used by some of BTFs more deranged red diaper babies.

My personal recommendation to the F.B.I. would be to make a very close examination of the paper and home printers being used by some of BTFs more deranged red diaper babies.

Right.... Because Lerner being sold -- by Issa and others -- as the ringmaster of a vast conspiracy to sic the IRS after conservative groups is drawing... liberal death threats?

I'm not quite sure what you're trying to say here -- that we're threatening Lerner because she might spill the beans on our dastardly plan to deprive cons of their freedom via the IRS?

Hells... just this morning on my Facebook feed -- I've already had one-Fox watching uncle proclaim that people need to take the streets TODAY!!!! because 'Murca is dying at the hands of the Kenyan Usurper and his IRS goons, while another HS friend apparently thinks "the war has begun" because Connecticut law enforcement is moving forward with confiscating firearms from people who are no longer legally entitled to be firearm owners.

Fox must really be revving up this morning, because after getting over 200 rants via e-mail from my pool playing buddy, he now for the first time called me to tell me I "had to" turn on the TV to watch Lerner take the 5th. You could practically hear him pumping away while he was watching.

Meanwhile, there remains but one actual denial of tax-exempt status to any organization that applied for one, and that was to a liberal group: The Maine Chapter of Emerge America. I'm sure that little Brown Diaper Joey will take this into consideration.

Hells... just this morning on my Facebook feed -- I've already had one-Fox watching uncle proclaim that people need to take the streets TODAY!!!! because 'Murca is dying at the hands of the Kenyan Usurper and his IRS goons, while another HS friend apparently thinks "the war has begun" because Connecticut law enforcement is moving forward with confiscating firearms from people who are no longer legally entitled to be firearm owners.

I always have the same one-line response. "So when's your revolution starting, McVeigh?"

"It may well be we have gotten to the bottom of it," Issa said. "At this point, roads lead to Ms. Lerner. The witness who to took the Fifth. That becomes -- she becomes one of the key characters at this point. Had she been willing to explain those emails which were provided through separate subpoenas, then we could have perhaps brought this to a close. Without that, it may dead end with Ms. Lerner."

I'm surprised no enterprising TPer hasn't yet thought of nicknaming Issa "blue balls" yet... I mean, how many times can he directly -- and then a whole media noise apparatus leaning on him -- keep going breathlessly to the same sorts of wells in search of the smoking gun and then come back up with plain old rocks that maybe vaguely resemble a firearm if you squint hard enough and pretend really, really, well.

I'm surprised no enterprising TPer hasn't yet thought of nicknaming Issa "blue balls" yet... I mean, how many times can he directly -- and then a whole media noise apparatus leaning on him -- keep going breathlessly to the same sorts of wells in search of the smoking gun and then come back up with plain old rocks that maybe vaguely resemble a firearm if you squint hard enough and pretend really, really, well.

It's more fun to call him some variation of Grand Theft Issa, or to remind everyone that he's an arsonist.

I'm not downplaying Hitler - I'm saying there's a pretty big gulf of difference between a Hitler and autocrat - even an autocrat prone to brutality, totalitarianism, etc... and I think the gulf gets comically large when we also add this layer of "our guy" vs "NOT our guy" autocrats to the analysis.

But at the time of Munich, Hitler wasn't Hitler, the holocaust was in the future and with Saarland, Austria and Sudetenland, a charitable observer could think that he only wanted all the German-speaking territories.

BTF cult hero HRC just compared Putin to Hitler, and his actions to Hitler's actions in the 1930s, saying (as previously noted in this space) that he is a man "who believes his mission is to restore Russian greatness."

BTF cult hero HRC just compared Putin to Hitler, and his actions to Hitler's actions in the 1930s, saying (as previously noted in this space) that he is a man "who believes his mission is to restore Russian greatness."

But at the time of Munich, Hitler wasn't Hitler, the holocaust was in the future and with Saarland, Austria and Sudetenland, a charitable observer could think that he only wanted all the German-speaking territories.

There are plenty of ethnic Russians in ex-Soviet territories other than Ukraine -- Latvia, for instance. Do they also need "protection"?

Hitler as of 1938 wasn't HITLER!! At the same time there was no logical model to project around German expansionism in 1938. There was no existing map to explain where it might end. There is a known model of where Russia will stop expanding.

Hitler as of 1938 wasn't HITLER!! At the same time there was no logical model to project around German expansionism in 1938. There was no existing map to explain where it might end. There is a known model of where Russia will stop expanding.

Oh great, you're ready to cede Putin everything east of the Elbe?

What effed up logic says Russia has the right to subjugate 150 million Eastern Europeans because they "fear the West"?

What effed up logic says Russia has the right to subjugate 150 million Eastern Europeans because they "fear the West"?

Probably the same logic that said we had the right to overthrow Mohammad Mossadegh because we feared high oil prices. Probably the same logic that prompted the Bay of Pigs invasion because we didn't like what was going on in Cuba. Countries can always find reasons to support their brand of logic, and logic to support those reasons. And a country's internal form of government doesn't necessarily exempt a country from falling into that same pattern of rationalization.

Probably the same logic that said we had the right to overthrow Mohammad Mossadegh because we feared high oil prices. Probably the same logic that prompted the Bay of Pigs invasion because we didn't like what was going on in Cuba. Countries can always find reasons to support their brand of logic, and logic to support those reasons. And a country's internal form of government doesn't necessarily exempt a country from falling into that same pattern of rationalization.

We subjugated exactly zero of those countries.

And had the Bay of Pigs succeeded, the new Cuban leader would have been far superior to Castro.

And, as you implicitly agree, we didn't do what we did in those countries because of paranoia, but for substantive reasons.

There is no reason to think "appeasing" Hitler made him notably better or worse.

Sure there is. Substantial elements of the Army were ready to depose him as soon as he was humiliated and forced to back down by France and the UK. Problem is, they never backed him down, and his long string of triumphs made him very hard to get rid of.

This should go without saying, but I have no idea what "Hitler wasn't Hitler yet in 1938" could possibly mean. The Nuremburg Laws dated from 1935. Anybody charitable toward Hitler in 1938, even before Kristallnacht, was politically tone-deaf, as Charles Lindbergh proved when he accepted a medal from Goering a couple of weeks after Munich. That move cost Lindbergh a huge amount of credibility in the US, even among those who were not actively anti-Nazi. (EDIT: even among those who were actively isolationist!)

Sure there is. Substantial elements of the Army were ready to depose him as soon as he was humiliated and forced to back down by France and the UK. Problem is, they never backed him down, and his long string of triumphs made him very hard to get rid of.

That's wishcasting --

By 1939, Hitler's grip on Germany was hardly teetering... He basically secured overwhelming supermajorities of military support 5 years earlier when he dispatch with Rohm and the SA.

Doesn't matter anyway; Hitler's just an historical precedent. If you honestly think it isn't applicable (*), so be it.

Doesn't change the fact that Putin has (1) declared the end of the Soviet Union to be a terrible tragedy; (2) used and threatened force against NATO and near-abroad countries; (3) promulgated a right to use force to protect ethnic Russians in ex-Soviet territories; and (4) used force to protect ethnic Russians in ex-Soviet territories.

His logic and pronounced "doctrine" would apply to a place like Latvia.

Glad we got right into it this time, rather than the usual first page where everyone pretends to like each other.

It's certainly not crazy to bring up Hitler when someone is invading European countries with the stated justifications of "this was historically our territory"/"they speak our language"/"we're trying to protect our oppressed ethnic brethren in this region." It's a much less farfetched parallel than most of the times we invoke Hitler, anyway.

Still, The Hitler Experience (which is also one of the less family-friendly IMAX films...) did not prove that every attempt to conquer territory has to be resisted by the entire world until the aggressor completely retreats. If Russia tries to move into western Ukraine and everyone sits around sucking their thumb, then we're at least talking something Hitleresque. But I really don't see that happening. Not that we shouldn't be preparing for it; indeed, if it's done properly, preparing for it can make it even less likely to happen. But I think it's vanishingly unlikely. And everyone who estimates that their enemy is not infinitely warlike is not automatically wrong because they would have been wrong once in 1939.

This should go without saying, but I have no idea what "Hitler wasn't Hitler yet in 1938" could possibly mean. The Nuremburg Laws dated from 1935. Anybody charitable toward Hitler in 1938, even before Kristallnacht, was politically tone-deaf, as Charles Lindbergh proved when he accepted a medal from Goering a couple of weeks after Munich. That move cost Lindbergh a huge amount of credibility in the US, even among those who were not actively anti-Nazi. (EDIT: even among those who were actively isolationist!)

And then it became 1000 times worse.

EDIT: What I mean is that it was possible in 1938 to imagine that Hitler, loathsome as he was, would have limited ambitions.

with the stated justifications of "this was historically our territory"/"they speak our language"/"we're trying to protect our oppressed ethnic brethren in this region."

That's actually a pretty common justification/rationalization actually, - most (vast majority) of those who invoke it don't go on to become Hitler though.

Doesn't matter anyway; Hitler's just an historical precedent. If you honestly think it isn't applicable (*), so be it.

He's a data point, but he's an outlier. It's like if you take 10 polls, and 9 say that "A" will beat "B" by 10 points, and 1 says that "B" will win by 10 points- pointing to Hitler is like pointing to that one poll.

Of course Hitler did happen and every now and then that outlier poll is the one that's accurate.

He's a data point, but he's an outlier. It's like if you take 10 polls, and 9 say that "A" will beat "B" by 10 points, and 1 says that "B" will win by 10 points- pointing to Hitler is like pointing to that one poll.

Of course Hitler did happen and every now and then that outlier poll is the one that's accurate.

Sure, but you have to plan for the outliers. Saying Putin's logic would fit Latvia isn't a prediction that he's going to invade Latvia (*), but it is a reason to contemplate a possible invasion/provocation of Latvia, plan for it, and try to prevent it.

(*) As I'm sure it will be claimed down the road by the board's lefties ("You've been WRONG about everything!!!!")

I'm not downplaying Hitler - I'm saying there's a pretty big gulf of difference between a Hitler and autocrat - even an autocrat prone to brutality, totalitarianism, etc... and I think the gulf gets comically large when we also add this layer of "our guy" vs "NOT our guy" autocrats to the analysis.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday compared recent actions by Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Ukraine to those implemented by Adolf Hitler in the late 1930s. Putin’s desire to protect minority Russians in Ukraine is reminiscent of Hitler’s actions to protect ethnic Germans outside Germany, she said.
. . .
“Now if this sounds familiar, it’s what Hitler did back in the 30s,” she said. “All the Germans that were ... the ethnic Germans, the Germans by ancestry who were in places like Czechoslovakia and Romania and other places, Hitler kept saying they’re not being treated right. I must go and protect my people and that’s what’s gotten everybody so nervous.”

The previous thread also had some posters dismissing the comparison of Russia's actions toward Ukraine to Germany's actions toward Czechoslovakia in the run-up to WWII. Perhaps they will be looking for a less bellicose candidate.

Mussolini was thuggish, Mussolini embarked on a Military buildup and wanted to reconstitute the Roman Empire- he couldn't do what Hitler did because of various factors including having a far smaller industrial base and not having inherited what was left of the old Prussian General Staff like Hitler did - Mussolini was almost as willing as Hitler to order his Army to invade neighboring Countries, his Army simply wasn't as capable.

2014 Russia is of course not 1939 Germany or Italy. 2014 Russia does not have a relative industrial base on a par with 1939 Germany's- in fact it's more comparable to 1939's Italy. Putin's military is however almost certainly better organized and prepared than Mussolini's was (despite what Snapper thinks).

He wants to tax hedge fund earnings as income rather than capital gains, impose the "Buffet Rule", and expand EITC and the Child Care Tax Credit. There is $76 billion over the next decade to expand early childhood education, financed by the tobacco tax. $70 billion in highway infrastructure financed by taxing multinational corporations. $56 billion committed to basically fend off sequester cuts.

2014 Russia is of course not 1939 Germany or Italy. 2014 Russia does not have a relative industrial base on a par with 1939 Germany's- in fact it's more comparable to 1939's Italy. Putin's military is however almost certainly better organized and prepared than Mussolini's was (despite what Snapper thinks).

Gee, that's a high standard of comparison.

The Russian military today is probably comparable to the Ukrainian/Polish/Spanish military, and grossly inferior unit-for-unit to the US, UK, Germany, France, etc.

This really shouldn't be controversial. I mean, the Russians got their ass kicked invading Chechnya the first time.

I don't think that statement betrays Jason seeing Hitler everywhere; but even if he did, I wouldn't necessarily begrudge him. It was kind of a big deal.

Thanks, Lassus. I was pointing out that, the Cold War notwithstanding, Americans have historically preferred staying clear of messy situations outside of our own hemisphere. I do wish we would be a bit more concerned.

Sam, it is well known that, had France mobilized to stop Hitler's 1936 march into the Rhineland, the army would have deposed him. IIRC, the Führer had even gone so far as to promise to take his own life.

The previous thread also had some posters dismissing the comparison of Russia's actions toward Ukraine to Germany's actions toward Czechoslovakia in the run-up to WWII. Perhaps they will be looking for a less bellicose candidate.

I agree with Yearrgh. A bit of an idiot and unhelpful thing to say, but I'll live with it. Like you did with your Prez candidates, right YC?

The Senate voted 47-52 Wednesday to reject controversial nominee Debo Adegbile to lead the Department of Justice's Division of Civil Rights. Seven Democrats voted against moving forward with President Obama’s nomination of Adegbile, which the Fraternal Order of Police and other groups opposed because of his involvement in the defense of Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was convicted of killing a Philadelphia police officer in 1981. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) switched his vote from "yes" to "no" in a procedural move that allows him to bring the nomination up again for a future vote.
. . .
It's the first time a nomination has gone down since Democrats changed the Senate's filibuster rules to require simple majority votes on many procedural motions. Along with Reid, the Democratic votes against Adegbile were Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.), Joe Manchin (W.Va.), Mark Pryor (Ark.), Joe Donnelly (Ind.), John Walsh (Mont.), Chris Coons (Del.) and Bob Casey (Pa.). Several Democrats in tough reelection races this year voted in favor of the nomination. Sens. Kay Hagan (N.C.), Mary Landrieu (La.) and Mark Begich (Alaska) are Republican targets in this year's midterms, but all three voted in favor of moving the nomination forward.

This should go without saying, but I have no idea what "Hitler wasn't Hitler yet in 1938" could possibly mean.

He was an anti-semitic thug who ran a country, sadly such a phenomenon was no unheard of in that point in History, he was just another one.
If you told someone in 1938 that Hitler:
Was going to invade Poland, move in German "settlers," reduce the Polish Population to a state of feudal Serfdom- except for the Jews, whom he'd cram into "ghettos" -10s of thousand of people per block, most would not believe it.

If you then told them that he was going to:
Invade Norway;
Invade The Netherlands
Invade Belgium
Invade France;
and win
less would believe you

Install a puppet Government in France
Invade Yugoslvia and Greece- but ONLY so he could guard his flank for his invasion of the USSR- the largest land invasion in history- and within a year of that invasion he will have deliberately starved 2 MILLION POWs to death- and had roving death squads in Eastern Europe MURDER maybe a half million civilians (mostly for the crime of being Jewish)

just about no one would believe you- and we haven't even gotten yet to the slave labor camps- the rounding up of Jews from all over occupied Europe to send to slave labor and/or DEATH camps

and oh yeah, during his invasion of the USSR, right after he's stopped outside Moscow- meaning the USSR is still in the fight- he then declares war on the largest industrial power in the world.

No one sees that in 1938, at worst they're thinking "how do we avoid a repeat of 1914"?

Hey, wouldn't now be a jolly good time to head out the door to a meeting while leaving behind the link to Jonah Goldberg's recent column entitled, "Nazis: Still Socialists?"

Stanley writes:

That Hitler wasn’t a socialist became apparent within weeks of becoming Chancellor of Germany when he started arresting socialists and communists. He did this, claim some, because they were competing brands of socialism. But that doesn’t explain why Hitler defined his politics so absolutely as a war on Bolshevism — a pledge that won him the support of the middle-classes, industrialists and many foreign conservatives.

There’s a stolen base here. Sure, Hitler’s effort to destroy competing socialists and Communists “doesn’t explain” all those other things. But it doesn’t have to. Nor does Stalin’s wholesale slaughter (or Lenin’s retail slaughter) of competing Communists and socialists explain the Molotov–Ribbentrop pact or the infield-fly rule. Other considerations — economic, cultural, diplomatic — come into play. But when people say Hitler can’t be a socialist because he crushed independent labor unions and killed socialists, they need to explain why Stalin gets to be a socialist even though he did likewise.

The fact that many “foreign conservatives” supported Hitler’s hostility to Bolsheviks is a bit of a red herring. Many conservatives today support the military in Egypt as a bulwark against the Muslim Brotherhood. That tells you next to nothing about the content of the junta’s domestic policies. But, it’s worth noting that some foreign Communists and liberals, such as W.E.B. Du Bois, actually supported Hitler’s domestic economic policies (though not the anti-Semitism) in the mid-1930s.

For what it’s worth, the reason that Hitler declared war on Bolsheviks is a rich topic. The short answer is that he was a socialist but he was also a nationalist (hence national-socialism). And the nationalist part considered Bolshevism an existential threat — which it was!

Sam, it is well known that, had France mobilized to stop Hitler's 1936 march into the Rhineland, the army would have deposed him. IIRC, the Führer had even gone so far as to promise to take his own life.

Alright, the French mobilize and march into the Rhineland. With what army, what funding, and what popular support.

He likely would have scurried right back out of there and his domestic support would have taken a hit, he wasn't one to voluntarily give up or share power so he'll likely would have spent the rest of his time in power suppressing internal dissent (kind of like post Desert Storm Hussein)

or supported the Czechs in 1938, Hitler gets a bullet behind the ear.

No way, he was raring to go and if France supported the Czechs it would have been like they "supported" Poland a year later- Hitler's fate would have been contingent on how well the invasion of Czechoslovakia went- the 1938 Wehrmacht was not yet 1939's- and not having given up the Sudetenland yet the Czechs had defensible fixed positions- a German invasion in 1938 could have bogged down at the initial thrust, but even so it's had to see any Prussian Officer actually working up the nerve yet to simply shoot him, but given the way Hitler later reacted to military adversity it's possible

Correct. Even during the war there were assassination plots as early as 1941.

If the French had counter-invaded the Rhineland, or supported the Czechs in 1938, Hitler gets a bullet behind the ear.

Assassination plots are not military coups - I think one of the early captured generals had said to the British in effect "why didn't you stop him at Munich, we would have followed and deposed him?".... and I think the British response was basically quite right and proper, in effect - they would have needed to fight a war that no way in hell were either France or Britain prepared to fight, have won - or at least fought to a stalemate, and then the Wehrmacht would have gotten rid of Hitler?

I mean, come on.... France and Britain were not in any way, shape, or form prepared to fight in '38. The idea that a few generals - who managed to talk bravely at Nuremberg or in post-war memoirs - claim getting rid of Hitler would be easy is just folly.

There were plenty of committed Nazis already in the upper levels of the Wehrmacht by even '38.... there were also plenty of high ranking officers who, while perhaps not pro-Nazi, were quite interested in the restoration of old-fashioned Prussian pride - however much they may have disliked the mustachioed Austrian corporal, they liked the lingering sting of Versailles even less.

After the furherprinzip, after long knives, Hitler was never going to be internally "deposed" in any sort of bloodless coup... Assassinated? Maybe... but it's telling that there were plenty of assassination attempts on Hitler prior to Danzig -- to the best of my knowledge, they were all the work of what were in context of the times "dissidents"...

I think people are reading far too much into the post-war musing of a few self-serving generals who, after the war, needed some way to explain to themselves and the world "how could this have happened?"

I mean - look no further than the failed '44 bomb plot... Hitler wasn't killed, but post-bombing elements were in motion to seize control of the government. Germany was still fighting what was obviously the same losing war the day after the failed bombing as they were the day before.... but the plotters were quite easily overwhelmed, arrested, and put on sham trial. It strains credibility to think that before Germany was clearly being demolished any sort of coup or power grab could have/would have been able to just push him aside if only the allies had stood up to him.

Now I find myself agreeing with Clapper... Because yeah -- Mein Kampf was pretty darn clear on a whole manner of things and indeed, published well before the Nazis had any real power. Hell, we still have an awful lot of Hitler's speeches on tape before the early 30s elections gave the Nazis a plurality in the Reichstag... The speeches absolutely OOZE with the very totalitarianism that would come to pass. I'm not going to bother googling a translation/looking it up - but I remember one from college, leading up to the '32 elections, where he thunders that the 'opposition' is right about one thing: YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT THE NAZIS HAVE NO DESIRE TO WORK WITH OTHER PARTIES!!!! THAT'S OUR WHOLE POINT!

Alright, the French mobilize and march into the Rhineland. With what army,

The French army the active part of which was quite larger and better equipped than the 1935 German Army.

what funding

It wouldn't cost that much to send your active duty troops marching across the unguarded frontier, and once there feeding and housing them wouldn't cost much more than feeding and housing them in France.

and what popular support.

The President orders the Generals, the Generals order the troops to march and they march, by the time Newspaper Editorialists are bloviating and any large scale demonstrations are being organized, the Germans are already retreating- which will stop public opinion dead in its tracks

Alright, the French mobilize and march into the Rhineland. With what army, what funding, and what popular support.

I think this points to the different kinds of counter-factual history we're talking about. Chance or luck that certain individuals live or die? An example might be the moderate Duke of Bedford being probably the most powerful figure in the parliamentarian faction in 1641. But he dies of smallpox at the outset of the 1641 parliament, the firebrand Pym takes the lead and Civil War ensues. A corollary maybe is Hitler falls to an illness or some random assassin sometime between 1935-1938 or so.

A second level (which is I think what is being discussed here?) is sort of arm-chair GMing. "If I was in charge of France, I'd have done x", which I think you raise a legitimate point about. It's one thing to say, France could have done this, but it requires more than just someone in charge to have thought of it.

There is another level of counter-factual though that requires a bit more of a sophisticated change of circumstances. Maybe a figure convincingly argues that Hitler is a threat that needs to be nipped in the bud and events conspire to allow his message to be received by a significant population. Or things go differently at the level of organization for anti-German movements in UK or France.

This last one is probably the crux of counter-factuals as a useful tool for history, in that imagining possible outcomes leads us closer to understanding why, out of all the things that could have happened, we ended up with the world we got. It's not always, if ever, inevitable that one particular outcome is going to happen. It's possible the political will to stand up to Hitler at any time before 1939 could have existed. But I'm not sure that it did, and I think you're right that it would have taken more than an executive decision to move in French troops to create it.

Probably the same logic that said we had the right to overthrow Mohammad Mossadegh because we feared high oil prices. Probably the same logic that prompted the Bay of Pigs invasion because we didn't like what was going on in Cuba. Countries can always find reasons to support their brand of logic, and logic to support those reasons. And a country's internal form of government doesn't necessarily exempt a country from falling into that same pattern of rationalization.

Jesus, is the late Mohammad Reza Pahlavi now your model of democracy, or is it that you really really really fear high oil prices?

And had the Bay of Pigs succeeded, the new Cuban leader would have been far superior to Castro.

Yes, and of course we would've made sure that the Mafia and Batista's former cronies had no say in running the country, just like we did before 1959. Or is it only "lefties" who might dare to raise such a point?

Hey, wouldn't now be a jolly good time to head out the door to a meeting while leaving behind the link to Jonah Goldberg's recent column entitled, "Nazis: Still Socialists?"

Jonah Goldberg exist for no other reason that to pollute critical thinking...

Hitler himself never wrote or even really spoke in any endearing terms about socialism - maybe if you squint really hard, you can find some amorphous populism.

The only Nazi that survived past 1934 who had any real roots in socialism was Goebbels - and he had long since grown his Hitler chubby to such proportions that setting aside any ideology was easy. The rest - the Strasser brothers, Rohm, etc - were either killed in '34 or had fled the country. Hess was pure Hitler acolyte. Himmler was a salt-of-the-earth cum mystic agrarian ####. Goering was a Prussian aristocrat. Borman was another pure Hitler acolyte...

Agh, I just think all this Hitler analogy stuff is (a) automatic (b) massively beside the point for the 21st century.

Much nearer home, I am struck by the contrast between Iraq and Iran, two of the three members of the imaginary "Axis of Evil" identified by 43 after September 11th. One is in a shambles, 100,000 deaths of its own and 4,500 of ours later, with many, many thousands more lives permanently disrupted. The other is starting to cooperate with international agencies after a very long haul of patient economic sanctions, and war has been avoided. Granted, millions of Iranians have endured an oppressive regime meanwhile, but it's not like Iraq has been a paradise at any point either.

This contrast simplifies a lot of issues, but it's worth thinking about. We live in a much more globalized economy, with far greater freedom of movement and information than in 1938. I really do think that economic sanctions have great force, and that economic ostracism of Russia, or threat thereof, would have much greater longterm force – and infinitely less longterm destructiveness – than sending in the Marines. And I don't think that because I'm a naïve surrender monkey, but because I've got a huge object lesson staring at me from a few hundred miles to the southeast.

What is wrong with patience and non-violent pressure, both diplomatic and economic? The answer seems to be PUTIN IS A SHIRTLESS MADMAN, but it's not like Ahmadinejad or other Iranian leaders won any awards for sanity. Yet continual pressure seems to have swayed that regime (taking that conclusion very tentatively and with much salt, for sure).

#90. There was a pretty well organized plot, but how it would have actually played out is anybody's guess since the plotters could not get commitments from a pretty fair number of key players. And in general the Prussian officer corps took the oath that they had given to Hitler very seriously.

But the guys who were involved were higher up the command structure than the 1944 plotters and that might matter.

I think that it's far from clear that Hitler would have been deposed had the British and French agreed to support the Czechs. That doesn't mean WWII starts early though. I don't think anybody can truly say how Hitler would have reacted to a firm stand. He does not appear to have been seeking a war in 1938 -- though he was more optimistic than his senior planners as to how it would go if it came to war. (that doesn't make him right of course. As events later would show he really wasn't much of a military planner)